One of the most painful truths for foreign learners of German is that hardly any German speaks his or her mother language as textbooks propagate.

To put it crudely, German is a kind of diglossia, which means that various spoken dialects coexist. These dialects can even be that different from the standard language that even Germans have, from time to time, severe difficulties to understand the dialect from a region other than their own one. For example, when I (a native Brandenburgian) have to talk on the phone with a person, who comes from, for example, Saxony or Baden-Württemberg, I have to concentrate on the conversation and listen carefully to get the intentions of my interlocutor at the other end of the phone. Of course, German is not a serious diglossia – like Arabic – but certain rudiments are observable.

The bad news is: I am not proficient in every of the German dialects. The good news is: I am well versed with the Berlin dialect. On the one hand, Berlinese influences my Brandeburgian dialect to a certain degree, which enables me to speak the Berlin dialect fluently. On the other hand, Berlinese does still differ from my actual dialect, which makes it easier for me to recognize the differences between Standard German and Berlinese.

Below you find the five most striking characteristics of the Berlin dialect. It is important to me to point out that the following compilation is not a scientific description but simply an illustration of what I find most salient about the Berlin dialect.

1. “ich” (I) becomes “ick”

This may please all native speakers of English. In Berlin dialect the soft ch-sound in the word “ich” (I) becomes a k-sound.

Ick hab keene Zeit. / Ich habe keine Zeit. (I don’t have time.)

2. The expression “wa”

The word “wa” has different meanings. It can either be a question tag at the end of a sentence or a form of “wir” (we).

The fact that “wa” is a form of “wir” (we) does not mean that the standard form does not exist at all. “Wir” exists but rather only occurs in pre-verbal positions. That is, “wa” only occurs in post-verbal positions. – I will discuss this topic in detail in an upcoming post.

3. “g” becomes “j”

Saxons do not know the k-sound and Berliners do most of the time forget that there is a g-sound in the German language. Virtually, all g-sounds are usually pronounced as “j”.

Gestohlen = jestohlen (stolen)

Gehen = jehen (to go, to walk)

ganz = janz (entire; whole; completely)

gegeben = jejeben (given)

But it is possible to imagine the Berlin dialect without g-sounds. As above, the word “Glück” (luck) is pronounced with a g-sound in Berlinese. This is a result of the sound combination g-l, that is, it is simply quite difficult to articulate a “j” and “l”-sound in a row.

4. The diphthong “au” becomes “oo”

It is an enormous effort to pronounce German diphthongs and Berliners (as well as Saxons) are very lazy people, thus they transform the diphthong “au” into “oo”.

kaufen = koofen (to buy)

laufen = loofen (to walk)

auch = ooch (too; also)

Although this feature is fairly characteristic for the Berlin dialect, this form of substitution is again dependent on the surrounding sounds. Words with vowel clusters, so to speak, do not allow such a transformation or replacement. You cannot apply this sound-change to words like “bauen” (to build) and “schauen” (to look). There are several other exceptions but it would go beyond the scope of this post to list them all. But whenever you hear Berliners using a long “o”-sound you can be quite sure that it is the dialect-form of the diphthong “au”.

5. The diphthong “ei” becomes “ee”

The substitution of the standard diphthong “ei” by “ee” does exist but is rather arbitrarily used. This form occurs in words like “kein” (no) and “mein” (my). Whether “kein” turns into “keen” and “mein” into “meen” is dependent on the sentence structure. I will also discuss this in detail in a separate post.

Hello everybody!
I studied English and American Studies, Communication Science, and Political Science at the University of Greifswald. Since I have been learning English as a second language myself for almost 20 years now I know how difficult it is to learn a language other than your native one. Thus, I am always willing to keep my explanations about German grammar comprehensible and short. Further, I am inclined to encourage you to speak German in every situation.
Regards,
Sandra

Comments:

Dan:

Coming from the southeastern U.S., I have encountered similar experiences while traveling or living in different regions of America. However, I don’t imagine the differences between to be as distinct as the various German dialects, based on what I just read. However, the southern (Central Alabama, in particular) dialect tends to be quite a bit slower in pace when compared to standard American English or other dialects spoken in the States. This slowness in pace can drive someone, not used to the dialect, insane. Basically, one could make a case for the Southern dialect to be “lazy talk” or whichever way you want to approach it. Similar to the Pittsburghese dialect of Western Pennsylvania (and other rural dialects), there are a lot of contractions used such as (y’all for you all, ain’t for “is not”, n’at for “and that” etc.)

@Andrew Yes, good point (wat, dat). I don’t know which of the two is worse — “ick” or “wat” — igitt.

Michael:

So when you say the “g” is pronounced like a “j” do you mean pronounced like a German “j” (“y” in English) or an English “j” as in job?

jacobasfjlas:

it’s a German “j” , similar to an English “y”. that part i’m pretty sure of. But what i want to know is about the indefinite article and how it retains gender. I’m in Berlin now and it sounds there contracted but i’m not sure how it’s done. It sounds like its similar to the (in +dem) as in “Im Haus”. I’m even struggling to just recognize the articles in the nominative case though.

Gárate:

I learned German in Berlin, I can say that Berlinerisch is the least of the worries when dealing with german dialects, I just spent 2 months in Switzerland, and that was just aweful! for example, you just explained Berlinerisch quite well in 5 simple points, but to explain the swiss dialect you would need an entire Blog! BEWARE GERMAN LEARNERS! BEWARE!

christiane:

The ‘j’ in ‘jehen’ ist wie das Englische ‘y’ in ‘yellow’.

christiane:

Use of ‘t’ for final ‘s’ in words such as ‘was (wat) is typical. Here’s another
one: omission of final ‘n’ as in ‘nun’, which becomes ‘nu’: Wat nu?

Werner:

@Garate I am German and have trouble following the Swiss dialect. Also have trouble with Platt. I can understand Saxons very well. My dialect is Fraenkish and many GIs told me, it is the easiest to learn, because like in english, we drop some letters at the end.

TomE:

I would call Berlinisque ‘lazy’. The Berlin dialect (if you can say Berlin has 1 big dialect or metrolect) is as any other dialect it tries to be as practical and simple just enough to be understood. BTW the IK and IKKE for ich, dat/wat for das/was are comman Niederdeutisch/Low German characteristics. I am a native Dutch speaker and living near the German border both Dutch and Low German dialects like Low Saxon look very similar. Its the high german (which became standard German and prestige French which fe made the originale rolling r into some throatdesease one). Its the standard German which is fake a human made language and because of its status and prestige people learn to speak it. Dialects in general are never lazy or ugly they are just honest natural and original.

TomE:

That should be I would NOT call Berlinesque lazy.

t j mieczynskyj:

exactly

Mirko:

The reason why dialects are different from a standard language are of course not lazyness, and the reasons why “kaufen” is being pronounced “koofen” in the dialects of Berlin and other regions of Germany have to do with how the changes affecting language spread over time across regions (and social groups).
The “au” in High German “kaufen” derives from Old High German “ou” (“koufōn”), whereas the one in “bauen” derives from “ū” (“būan”). These changes didn’t happen at the same time and didn’t “travel” the same way. Just like in Switzerland they still say “Huus” for standard German “Haus” etc.

Michał:

How lovely to read this post! I’m Polish and I mainly speak this kind of German because I work in Görlitz, the östlichste Stadt Deutschlands.
Liebe Grüße aus Görlitz!

Nice Text! But there is to say, that the Berlin Dialect is really awfull. Nice regards from The Textentwicklungsbüro

BobQ:

I thought I noticed that, as in your Rule 1 where the terminal “ch” of “ich” became “k”, that non-sibilant terminal voiced consonants become their voiceless counterparts. So, “-g” becomes “-k” (e.g., as in “stressig”) and “-d” becomes “-t” (e.g., “hand”). Would you agree that this is a characteristic of Berlinese, or would you say this is a more general rule of spoken German?

Mary Ann Buckley:

I lived in Berlin from 1958 to 1962. While we were there, I saw a version of My Fair Lady in German, with the Berlin dialect the one that Liza Doolittle spoke. It was hilarious. I wish I remembered more of the German I knew then.

Bob:

I was stationed in Berlin between 1967 and 1970, as a member of the US Army. I was trained to speak and understand German during. 6-month course at the US armed forces’ language school in Monterey, California. I can’t say exactly what I did in Berlin, but if you know Berlin and know where Teufelsberg is, you will probably be able to figure it out.

After my German course and a few months of further training, I thought my German was — well, if not perfect, at least top-notch. Then I got to Berlin, and discovered I couldn’t understand anything that anyone was saying. Example:

At the site up on Teufelsberg, on one chilly October day, I was assigned to stay with a couple of German workmen while they were painting something — just to be sure they didn’t wander inside and see something they weren’t supposed to see. One of them turned to me and said, “Ikke hob doch janz kalte Beene, Mensch.” My startled response was, “Uh, wie bitte!” He said it again; I asked him to say it more slowly. Then more slowly. Then more slowly still, until finally he was saying, “IKKE! HOB! JANZ! KALTE! BEENE!”

His boss, who spoke English, came over then and told me, “He is telling you that he has very cold legs” — “Ich habe doch ganz kalte Beine, Mensch.” THAT’s the Berlin dialect.